Tag Archives: Australian Made Entertainment

This episode serves as both a “welcome back!” and a fond “farewell” to the excellent company Australian Made Entertainment (previously heard on the podcast with their wonderful shows Speaking in TonguesandOnce We Lived Here), who are presenting their last show in NYC before founders Kathleen & Matthew Foster bring their family & work to Los Angeles. West Coast, our loss is your gain.

Fittingly for their final NYC bow, AME is presenting an Aussie classic, David Williamson’s The Club, about the back-room negotiations and maneuverings of a football club in the 1970s, directed by Andrew H. Lyons. As noted in the interview, it feels like this play occupies an interesting spot between Glengarry Glen Ross and Moneyball—and don’t worry, you don’t have to know a thing about business, or Australian football, to enjoy the brilliant work going on right now at Urban Stages.

Listen in as Matthew, Andrew, and actor David Sedgwick discuss the struggles between tradition and business, moustaches, and how a contemporary Australian classic resonates in modern-day U.S.A.

“…what I saw getting into it was this tipping point of tradition vs. business, bottom-line vs. tradition…that’s where we were, we were right there at ‘do we hang on to tradition, do we keep America moving forward to help ourselves, or do we cut our losses, cut all that stuff, and go for the money‘…it’s the moment of the tipping point…”

When last we saw Australian Made Entertainment, Artistic Directors Matthew and Kathleen Foster were onstage in the drama Speaking in Tongues.

This time around, Matthew is in the director’s chair, and Kathleen is showcasing her beautiful singing voice with the company’s new show, a musical imported from Melbourne. Set on a rural sheep station, Once We Lived Here is about a family is fighting for the future—of the family farm, of their personal lives, and of their shared history.

Listen in as Matt and Kathleen, along with actors Morgan Cowling, Adam Rennie, Sean Cleary, and Renee Claire Bergeron discuss family drama as universal story, singing in your own accent (and learning someone else’s), selling up, and the cultural conversation made possible by producing an Australian musical in New York City.

One of the most beautiful things about New York City is its global nature; it truly feels like the center of everything, a place that people from all over the globe are drawn to. Three of the artists on this week’s episode are originally from the other side of the world, and are producing a play from their native Australia as part of the company’s mission to bring Aussie plays to New York.

If there’s more theatrical gold like this down under, Australian Made Entertainment is going to have much success Stateside.

Listen in as actors Michael Poignand & Laura Iris Hill, producers/actors Kathleen Foster & Matthew Foster, and director Bryn Boice of AME’s production of Andrew Bovell’s Speaking in Tongues discuss filling in the open spaces lovingly left by the playwright, creating two (and three) different characters each night, and bringing Australian works to the U.S.